SIR – In my village of East Hanney in Oxfordshire up to 1,000 new houses will have been built in five years, once current applications have been put into effect. The village will have become a small town. Villagers have protested en masse, to no avail.

East Hanney and its sister West Hanney are medieval villages that are already full. Both are built on a flood plain and suffer severe flooding in rainy seasons. Increasing the number of houses will increase this problem.

Twenty-five years ago, each village had a shop with a post office. The proprietors retired, and their children had no inclination to be shopkeepers. So the villages were left without shops.

But these two villages are in the true sense communities. A village group bought a portable cabin, arranged to run a post office, organised weekly trips to a cash and carry and established a rota of village volunteers to serve behind the counter six days a week. They are still doing it.

George Osborne, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Elizabeth Truss, the Environment Secretary, can’t have it both ways. If they want rural areas with delightful villages, they must not turn these villages into towns.

Instead, they could bring into being garden cities or for that matter “garden towns” as Mr Osborne had earlier suggested.

Arthur Taylor East Hanney, Oxfordshire

SIR – The Chancellor recognises that more homes are needed in rural areas. Organic housing growth in villages helps local schools, shops, pubs and post offices, while allowing tomorrow’s parents to stay in the area.

A recent survey by the National Custom and Self Build Association showed much more support for new self-built homes than for other methods. Villagers understandably opposed to executive housing developments usually welcome proposals for more affordable self-built homes, especially if these assist local people on modest incomes. For example, in Broadhempston, Devon, six local families are currently building their own eco-homes, costing £140,000 each, including the land. No speculative builder would match this.

We believe many parish councils would welcome proposals to provide a handful of self-build plots for local people. The result would be many thousands more homes built without arousing hostility.

Richard Bacon MP (Con) London SW1

SIR – As a country bumpkin trapped in suburbia, I hope that for the Government’s proposed additional houses in villages, local authorities will pay due regard to the rural ethos.

We do not want builders to save money in architects’ fees by putting up estates of previously approved designs for suburban houses which do not fit in. This has happened far too often, particularly with villages in my native Suffolk.

Ronald Last Selsdon, Surrey

Alienated migrants

There are concerns over the scale of immigration to Britain Photo: REX

SIR – News that Germany will accept a record 800,000 asylum seekers this year is alarming. It is dangerous for liberal European countries to admit too many immigrants with an entirely different way of life too quickly.

Political correctness has prevented a proper debate about immigration, but multiculturalism has clearly failed. France and Britain, in particular, have admitted large numbers of people who have refused to assimilate. This has led to alienation and mutual mistrust, with consequences illustrated by events in Tower Hamlets, Rotherham and Paris.

If we continue to ignore these realities, we are sowing the wind and the whirlwind will surely follow.

Gregory Shenkman London W8

SIR – I recently returned to Britain from Spain in my motorhome, via the Dieppe-Newhaven ferry route. I would estimate that the ferry contained between 20 and 30 motorhomes and caravans. I could have easily secreted three or four people in my vehicle.

However, at no time was the inside of my vehicle inspected and, as far as I could see, no other vehicle was inspected either.

Clive Miller Fuente Álamo de Murcia, Spain

Clapping too soon

SIR – Michael Henderson’s article makes me wonder what it is called when a “music lover” claps as soon as a piece finishes, depriving the rest of us of those few seconds of awe as the music floats away.

Joan Campanini Russell Twickenham, Middlesex

SIR – The Royal Albert Hall’s strange policy of broadcasting piped music in its corridors, bars and lavatories seems unlikely to promote considerate behaviour in the auditorium itself.

Richard Northcott London E7

Bag of tricks

SIR – I had problems with my handbag when flying with easyJet until a kind man told me that if you have a duty-free bag you can take that in addition to your cabin bag. He gave me a duty-free bag; I put my handbag in it and got on the plane.

America thrives with more university students

SIR – Martin Vander Weyer suggests that we don’t need 50 per cent of the population obtaining degrees.

That’s true. We need to catch up with the United States, a much more successful country, where 63 per cent of school-leavers went to university in 2013.

Professor Chris Barton Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire

SIR – Not long ago, it was very hard to get a highly paid job in industry or the City without a degree. Today, however, we are seeing companies competing to attract the best school-leavers. Tuition fees must also be a disincentive to going to university.

I am surprised that the number of university admissions is rising but it may not be long before this changes. That would be a shame, as university gives young people a broad range of options and three years of maturing before entering the work-place.

Barry Smith Loughborough, Leicestershire

Satnavs live in a world of their own

SIR – We have not named our satnav (Letters, August 22), but are quite amused by the way she says Grarntham and Newarkkk and best of all Rotterdarmm.

It’s almost worth driving to new places to hear what she will call them.

Nick Perry Lincoln

SIR – Satnav mispronunciation is not limited to foreign place-names. On a recent visit to Suffolk, we were directed to “Bury Street Edmunds”.

David Simons Bakewell, Derbyshire

SIR – My husband and I talk to the satnav and have named her Gladys – from “So glad I bought this”.

We think she is great – always prompt, calm and helpful. The accent is another subject.

Beryl Cain Birkenhead

SIR – Our present satnav (Blossom) is a model of patience and courtesy, taking our deviations from her planned route in her stride.

Our previous one (Myrtle) was a harridan, whose tetchy, irascible commands made journeys into unknown territories a trial of nerves. She now resides in the glove compartment.

Jo-Ann Rogers Alsager, Cheshire

SIR – How delightful that Peter Froggatt has named his satnav Tracey (Letters, August 21). If and when she gets directions wrong, he can honestly say he has disappeared with Trace.

Liz Beaumont London SW19

SIR – We call our satnav Camilla because there are three of us in the car.

Terry Lockhart Brentwood, Essex

Pressure to end lives

SIR – We are all doctors who work with people approaching the end of their lives. We are most concerned by the Bill before the House of Commons to legalise what is being called “assisted dying”.

We believe such proposals devalue the most vulnerable in society. We regularly come across patients who feel a burden to their relatives and to society because of their health and social care needs. These patients fit the criteria being proposed for being supplied with lethal drugs to end their lives.

They are mentally competent and are not, at least on the surface, being coerced by others to end their lives. But they may be under pressure from within to remove themselves as a burden on their hard-pressed families.

We fear that if Parliament were to legalise assisted suicide for terminally ill people, such pressures would be given free rein. Most families are loving and caring, but some are not.

The case for changing the law is being constructed on the basis that assisted suicide is needed to relieve the suffering of dying.

Dying is not an easy matter for anyone, but the advances that have been made in recent years in pain relief and the alleviation of distress have transformed the way in which the process of dying can be managed. “Hospice at home” is not yet as widely available as we would like. But it is undeniable that the incidence of “bad deaths” is much smaller today than was once the case.

Assisting suicide runs counter to our duty of care, is contrary to the “do no harm” principle and conflicts with policies for suicide prevention. As successive surveys and consultations show, the great majority of doctors are opposed to such legislation

Save as you vape

SIR – Paul Brazier (Letters, August 22) asks how much e-cigarettes cost, compared with the £8.20 for an NHS prescription.

I paid £37 for a starter pack, which may seem expensive. However, it costs me only £5 a week to top up with e-liquid, compared with £14 a day when I bought cigarettes.

Michael Bristow Bristol

Bring your own litter

SIR – If I were running a coffee shop and James Logan (Letters, August 22) brought his own biscuit and ate it on my premises I would definitely take issue.

Even so, I don’t mind people bringing their own food nearly as much as I mind their leaving their litter behind when they go.

Elayne Benjamin London NW4

Gather ye orchids ...

A Phalaenopsis orchid (sell-by date unknown) Photo: Alamy

SIR – In Waitrose at Kenilworth I saw a nice orchid reduced for quick sale, but when I picked it up to put it in my trolley, I was told by a member of staff that I could not buy it as it was past its sell-by date. The store manager too insisted that she wasn’t allowed to let it leave the store.

It was not as though the orchid was going to poison me if it was past an arbitrary sell-by date. It would be idiotic if this were the “law”, as I was told.